Description
Detailed Description
A super combination specimen, this piece features a main ball of translucent glassy stilbite crystals on a pair of epidote crystals, providing sharp colour contrast. The colour in this stilbite is a little darker than most, and in fact the stilbite crystals exhibit colour zoning. This can be seen upon close inspection of the main ball, but is even more obvious examining the small partial ball at the base of the specimen. In excellent condition – no damage to the main ball (minor rubs can be found with magnification) or the main horizontal epidote, while there is contacting on the vertical epidote and the smaller stilbite cluster is incomplete. A great, aesthetic miniature.
About These Stilbites
These beautiful yellow stilbite balls from Mali made their debut at Ste. Marie 2014. Although there has only been a small trickle of fine specimens since then, the deposit at Diamonkara has once again produced a number of very fine pieces. As in 2014, moderate-to-significant damage was almost ubiquitous, and high-quality specimens like the ones in this lot are very uncommon. As a side note, although there has been a push to sell these as specimens of stellerite, none of the analytical work done to date has confirmed any stellerite identification, to my knowledge (and I am aware some analytical work has been done).
As for the specimens themselves, the good Diamonkara pieces are absolutely some of the nicest and most distinctive stilbites I’ve ever seen from anywhere, with beautiful colour and form. They are perhaps not yet appreciated for what they are – these are striking, colourful display specimens of a mineral that is often pale and drab.
